music, food, lifestyle, film – California

Category: Music & Film

First of all, you’ll need a free membership to read this article. But since everyone knows Playboy is for reading articles, that won’t be a problem, right? Didn’t think so. That kind of can-do ‘tude is exactly the thing that’s carried the career of the young, smiley SoCal rapper-singer you see above—KYLE, who, come to think of it, isn’t looking super cheery in that photo. But he certainly sounds like he’s smiling every time he commits lyrics to tape, and in this lil’ profile (as on his new album, Light of Mine) we delve into the creative and psychological sources of all that unusual happiness.

…and it’s fairly complicated. Systemic oppression, unfair comparisons based merely on gender, the fact that they aren’t her. Actually, I grabbed that headline from the photo I’m using. This hails from a very brief interview with the young lady (she’s 15! be nice) in honor of the Billboard Music Awards, but we do—more or less—touch on the aforementioned themes vis à vis said “bitches.”

I had a trippy conversation with old Los Angeles music pal Ben Schneider of Lord Huron—about the void, the city, time and space, and the all-too-easy-to-forget idea that artists ought not to be bound by convention or expectation when crafting their universe. Fittingly, he called in from the Arctic Circle in the middle of the night on a break from hunting the Aurora Borealis. Learn more about Vide Noir, the band’s third album, by clicking through above. And also by listening to it (it’s really good).

Kendrick Lamar won a Pulitzer Prize for Music. I enjoy this news most as a slap in the face to the Grammys who’ve failed thrice over to give the man his Album of the Year due. So yes, of course Los Angeles should be proud that Lamar’s made history, but we should be a little embarrassed that our own institutions didn’t do nearly enough to help him get there (not that he needs it).

Look at that grinning mug (photographed by Pip Cowley). If Mike Posner really did take that pill in Ibiza, you’d guess it was still in his system. In person he’s bright and shining, calm and contemplative, fit and seriously glowing. Drugs didn’t do this, however, Mike did using his very own powerful mind and impressive willpower. And he shares his methods here in hopes that others (artists or workaday strugglers like the rest of us) might realize that they too have all it takes in order to be happy, healthy, and humming along just like this pop star and poet.

…AND MIKE BAGGETTA (sorry Mike!). If you didn’t know, Spotify has a blog that’s meant to be of service to artists. In fact, it is. But some (many? most? all?) of the articles are good reads for the rest of us too. This one that I had the honor to pen is a deep dive into the obvious and not-so-obvious ins and outs of DIY-ing one’s own tour with input from three experts on the subject. One is a speaker-shredding noisenik whose work I’m a huge fan of, Walter Gross. One is a genre-smearing guitar goddess who travels with a dog named Tupelo, Sophie Weil (a.k.a. Syko Friend). One is a jazz-etc. guitar god who just recorded an LP with Mike Watt and Jim Keltner overseen by the mighty Chris Schlarb, Mike Baggetta. Click on through to receive their hard-earned wisdom.

Aw man. Just seeing this picture of dude makes me want to hug him again. I sat down to talk with Rateliff and his lifelong best bud Joey Pope about the Night Sweats’ new album, Tearing at the Seams, and we wound up having a good cry. It turns out the man is going through a divorce. As burly and tattooed as he is, Rateliff is, to quote Richard Swift, a “goddamned sweetheart.” He’s also one of the hardest working musicians out there, and has survived more than his fair share of heartache along the way. In this piece, we talk about small towns, tough jobs, firing guns, losing faith, and making moonshine. Basically, it’s all of the things that make interviews good. Dig in.

Before anyone knew anything about the band Lo Moon, we knew their haunting, immersive, absurdly-long-for-a-debut single “Loveless.” If you haven’t heard the song, click to the article and scroll down to the video. Once you listen, it’ll twist itself around your DNA and simply be with you, at all times, forever. The new album, Lo Moon, is out today and while “Loveless” is too high a bar to exceed, there’s a lot of gorgeous, gossamer slow-rock goodness to take in. Now, isn’t it time you learn something about the band? TL;DR: their names are Matt, Crisanta, and Sam.

Live in Los Angeles? Home studios are everywhere in this city, and whether you listen to Top 40 or buy vinyl from Vacation, there’s a better than bad chance that some of the music you love was made in a residence near you. Maybe even next door. With the help of pop producer Ricky Reed, Grizzly Bear’s bassist/utilities man Chris Taylor, the irrepressible will.i.am, and a few folks behind the scenes, I give you this quick but kinda deep dive into the world of home-recording, which, as it turns out, happens to be the world that the rest of us live in… only, sometimes Kesha stops by.

Look, Lil Uzi Vert doesn’t love talking to press. Actually, it doesn’t seem like he hates the act so much as he doesn’t acknowledge it as a thing that exists within his purview (his own people warned me this would be like getting words out of a rock). So, after a million billion delays, I finally got the guy on the phone, and he somehow found ways to reduce even non-binary (I.E. yes or no) questions to single-word answers. I must’ve re-asked each one three different ways. Honestly, I’m impressed. But hey, he was nice enough and his whole thing is expressing himself in song without any filters, so what we wound up with is a little explainer on how “XO Tour Llif3” broke through, catapulting Luv Is Rage 2 to the No. 1 album in the country. Yah! Yah! Yah! Yah!